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comment by goobster
goobster  ·  2315 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Eastern Europeans Tire of Being Sold Inferior Products

I haven't lived over there for more than a decade, but I purchased all my electronics and musical gear outside Hungary to avoid paying a 50% - 500% markup.

The Apple laptop I bought visiting my family in Seattle was $1500. In Hungary it would have been $3500.

The bass guitar I had made for me in Dublin was 1200EUR. It was cheaper for me and my girlfriend to fly to Dublin for the weekend, pay for and pick up the guitar, and fly home to Budapest, than it was for me to get a similar instrument in Hungary.

At every level, this played out the same way for electronics and "finished" goods.

But I bought all my produce, meat, sparkling water, and other foodstuffs directly from local farmers at the markets, as I walked home from work each day. Lunch meat, cheese, sausage, beer, fruit and vegetables... everything I ate was pretty much local.

Dunno what it is like today, but I hear it is just as expensive as western europe for everything, now.